Twins mauled by fox have surgery on ‘life-changing’ face wounds

The twin babies mauled by a fox in their cots have suffered "life-changing injuries", their family said today.

The nine-month-old girls had surgery this morning after the attack left one of them with facial wounds "like something from a horror movie".

Parents Nicolas and Pauline Koupparis have been at their bedsides since they were attacked on Saturday night.One of the girls, Isabella, is at Great Ormond Street Hospital, while the other, Lola, is recovering from severe wounds to her face and arms at the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel.

Their uncle David Watson, who visited the Koupparis's home in Homerton, Hackney, with their aunt Barbara, said: "It's pretty life-changing if a fox has mauled you in the arm and face. They're going through surgery at the moment. They're improving. Lola is a lot better and Isabella is at Great Ormond Street."

Asked about the parents, he said: "They're bearing up under the circumstances. We've been ferrying messages between them as they are at different hospitals."

Fashion designer Mrs Koupparis, 41, said that she hoped the "horrendous" attack would help put an end to the menace in urban areas and that she was "emotionally drained".

Mrs Koupparis found the twins crying and covered in blood moments after they were bitten by the fox, which had crept into her home through doors left open because of the warm weather.

She had been watching Britain's Got Talent with her husband, 40, a television company accountant. Their four-year-old brother Max was sleeping in a bedroom upstairs. Mrs Koupparis said: "It's been a horrendous time. My priority is my babies but this incident has to be used to put pressure on the relevant bodies to act on the fox problem. It would help me feel that a negative could be made a positive."

Following the attack pest controllers set traps in the back garden and a fox found in one was humanely destroyed by a vet.

Mayor Boris Johnson today stepped up pressure on councils to deal with the increasing number of foxes.

"People like to think foxes are a wonderful addition to the flora and fauna of London but they are undoubtedly a pest," he said. "They are a menace in their scavenging for rubbish and as you saw in the last couple of days they can, in very rare circumstances, present a threat to human beings as well.

"Therefore it's right that boroughs should focus on their duties for pest control because as romantic and cuddly as a fox is, it is also a pest."